


Hot Mess

by sunbean72



Category: Iron Man (Movies), The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Anxiety Attacks, Anxiety Disorder, Awesome Pepper Potts, BAMF Pepper Potts, Be still my poor pepprony heart, Bruce Banner & Tony Stark Friendship, Bruce Banner Has Issues, Gen, Pepper Potts & Tony Stark Friendship, Protective Bruce Banner, Protective Tony Stark, Tony Stark Has A Heart, Tony Stark Has Issues, Tony Stark Needs a Hug, kind of tipping your way a little bit, my how the figits have spinned, well well well how the turntables, who's the hot mess now
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-10-01
Updated: 2017-10-24
Packaged: 2019-01-04 17:20:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 15,503
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12173358
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sunbean72/pseuds/sunbean72
Summary: Set right after Iron Man 3 but before Tony was able to tweak Extremis. Tony still has the arc reactor, Pepper is still super strong and super traumatized. Bruce Banner comes at Tony's request to help him figure out Extremis.





	1. Chapter 1

**Just gonna stand there and watch me burn**  
**Well that's all right because I like the way it hurts**  
**Just gonna stand there and hear me cry**  
**Well that's all right because I love the way you lie  
I love the way you lie **

She hadn't understood, before, what it meant to burn. It was not an understanding she came to lightly, and no, she didn't think it was worth it. That happened, sometimes, that failures didn't teach something important, but only something painful and difficult to unlearn.

Sometimes failures brought about important change, though. She tried to remember that. That often something truly good and brilliant came from learning something the hard way. There was a way to look at it so it didn't... it didn't... what exactly was it doing? She wasn't sure.

...

Pepper had spent a lot of time worrying about Tony Stark. That was at least, like, 85% of her life actually, and 100% of the reason why she appreciated a nice, dry martini with lots of olives (like at least three). 

There had been a time, perhaps more simple, that he hadn't been hers to worry about, except as it pertained to her job. Her contract, page 3 subsection 6A. Worry as appropriately dictated by her job description between normal business hours and alternating weekends no holidays. Back when she was his Personal Assistant. She had heard, everyone had heard, about his wild and womanizing ways. When she'd applied for the job, it was for the very nice salary and yes, oh, those are very nice benefits thank you very much. She'd been determined and prepared to have a Discussion, even a Very Firm Discussion of Boundaries when needed. There were some things she very firmly refused to have to worry about, and Tony Stark trying to seduce her was number one on her list.

To her surprise, aside from a bitingly caustic sarcasm and general mission to annoy her as much as possible (Tony seemed to equate exasperation with affection, but that was a whole other story) and a casual charismatic flirtation that he applied to everyone in his circle with a broad brush, he was surprisingly... gentle with her, at times. Respectful, mostly, except to harangue her.

She'd found it easy to compartmentalize her work, her job, her worry for Tony at first. It wasn't that hard, actually, she'd just turn her phone off and not think about him at all when she wasn't getting paid to. It had started to bleed in, a little bit, the worry had. When she started noticing the _not_ worrisome things about him. The kind of nice things. Ironically, that was what started stripping away her precious compartmentalization.

The truth was, she was madly in love with Tony before he ever got kidnapped, before he ever became the man he became, before he was ever Iron Man. She loved his brilliance. She loved how he talked to the bots. She loved how he kept it on the down low but he knew most of Stark Industry employees by name and watched out for them. He was proud of them and took care of them and made sure that he was a fair employer. He'd done all that but no one had ever talked about any of that. They talked about the alcohol and the women and the videos but they didn't talk about how he'd quietly helped that secretary in Research when his dad died. Didn't talk about how he anonymously helped pay off another employee's vet bill when her cat got hit by a car and they were passing a hat around. She hadn't even known how he'd heard about it; she had to tell him every detail of his meetings, meals, eating, everything.

It had taken a little while to figure out that Tony was perfectly capable of keeping track of details he thought important. Once she knew to look for it, there was a pretty easy way to tell what mattered to him.

It had been three days since he disappeared in Afghanistan when a card showed up in her mailbox, with his handwriting on the envelope which was slightly torn and a little beat up looking. It had given her a heart attack, she thought for a crazy moment he'd found some way to communicate with her or he was dead and it was some weird missive from beyond the grave it was so stupid but she'd been that surprised. It was a birthday card to her; he hadn't forgotten. It was post-dated the day before her birthday, it must have gotten slightly lost in the mail somewhere. It was dumb joke birthday card that would have made her roll her eyes any other time but in this case it sent her kneeling on the floor, so sad and overwhelmed. A stupid birthday card but with an address to an art curator who was holding one of the paintings she'd wanted for the collection last year that he'd said was too ugly without enough red in it. He said it was for her personal collection and under no circumstances did he want to see it on Stark property. It had seemed he never would, perhaps, and worse, that she would never get to thank him. He wouldn't have appreciated the gratitude anyway. He liked to pretend he didn't care.

She'd gone to the mansion after she found the card. There was no reason why except it was his place, his home, it belonged to him. It was the first time but not the last that she spoke to JARVIS. He'd politely asked her for any information she might have, and they had talked for nearly an hour about possiblilities and theories they'd both heard. After that she came once or twice a week just to check on him. The gentle AI was all she tangebly had left of her boss and friend, and she could sometimes ask him what he thought Tony would want her to do. He didn't always have answers but she always felt better after talking to him. She always felt bad, leaving the mansion, leaving JARVIS alone. She had a strange feeling he got lonely there.

When Tony came back, she started to realize she had feelings for her boss. It was incredibly embarrassing, and an incredibly bad time to realize it. Embarrassing because of all the years and all the times that she'd told herself she was fending him off, was too smart and too independent to fall for someone as sleazy as Tony Stark. But he wasn't sleazy and she _had_ developed feelings for him. The bad timing came from the fact that Tony was dealing with a huge crisis in his life-- every possible way that he'd defined himself was crumbling around him in spectacular fashion and at first she hadn't even realize it. For all her intelligence when it came to Tony, she hadn't even realized at first how he'd changed on a fundamental level.

His role as a philanthropic, benevolent inventor and protector of America was utterly disillusioned. He was, simply, not who or what he thought he was. He'd seen in the most horrific and traumatic way possible-- the very people he'd supposed he was protecting be brutally killed, as he watched, by weapons he'd created to defend them. Rhodey had confided in her once that when he'd finally found Tony, wandering through the desert wounded and half dead, he'd had the clothes on his back, the shoes on his feet, and a New York Met's watch. A cheap piece of plastic and metal that had been shattered and not working anyway. When Rhodey had asked him about it, with shaking hands Tony had thrown the broken watch away. "Why'd you bother keeping it just to throw it away?" Rhodey had asked, wondering if he should be questioning his friend's sanity. It had belonged to one of the soldiers in the Humvee with him, Tony had explained. Jimmy. He'd noticed him wearing it when they were posing for a picture. Then later, it was on the wrist of the man holding his head underwater.

As Tony was escaping, he saw the same man dead and had stopped to take it off his wrist. He didn't want the terrorist to have it, even in death. It was a symbol of all the things they had taken that didn't belong to them. Weren't meant for them. The watch reminded him of his failure to those soldiers.

After he got home from Afghanistan, he couldn't pretend to be the playboy anymore either. What used to be somewhat uncomfortable and awkward for him, something he forced himself to push through because he was just being stupid, now made him physically ill to contemplate. The arc reactor in his chest, he didn't show that to anyone. It was the most vulnerable, private, personal, painful part of him, barely adequate for protecting his heart from the shrapnel that threatened him at every moment. He would never expose it to a stranger, a woman he barely knew. _He_ didn't even like looking at it. Christine Everhart had the dubious distinction of being the last woman to further the playboy reputation of Tony Stark.

The money had gone, too. It was perhaps the least problematic for him emotionally but ended up being what cost him most, in the end. In a matter of hours, millions if not billions of dollars in company stock were erased as if they'd never been when he'd announced he was halting weapons production. A seemingly inexorable company went from solid to questions of solvency and viability overnight. Pepper hadn't been able to get a solid answer about it when she came to him with her concerns, but it was, perhaps, what pushed Stane to try and kill him again. If it weren't for Tony stopping the weapons manufacturing, Stane likely would have let Tony be, at least for a while, to avoid suspicion. Tony had never cared about the money, much, mostly because he'd never had to live without it before.

And so much for genius. He hadn't been able to see the truth staring him right in the face. Obadiah had been his true enemy all along. 

She'd inadvertently gotten closer to the new Tony Stark, the stranger, as he reshaped himself, reshaped his own future. He'd admitted he didn't have anyone else and she'd realized, to her surprise, she could honestly echo the sediment. She'd worried about him and loved him though she didn't maybe see it except as glimpses once when he'd trusted her with his hand in his chest and once when they were dancing and his hand was on her hand and he was _that close_ and she thought she was embarrassed, thought she was worried about what people thought but that didn't explain the painful sweetness in her chest, in her heart. It was what she kept trying to deny. She loved him. Even then, maybe mostly then.

Then he was Iron Man and he was something new again to both of them and she just wanted to be there for him and she had him back after all in an unexpected way and she had time, now, to explore that and figure out what it might mean.

Then he was dying and didn't tell her. Her worry then was that she'd been wrong, how could she be so wrong about the man she thought he was? He was worse than she'd ever seen him. He was obnoxious and selfish and more snarky and sarcastic than she'd ever known and then in the next moment he would be kind and giving and gentle and as if his heart was breaking somehow. It felt like goodbye, but all weird and wrong. She couldn't understand it. She couldn't understand him. She worried and she broke her own heart. The explanation of why he'd behaved that way when it came was almost too late except she'd seen all along that he was performing some kind of act, some kind of deception. Understanding of his behavior had felt like she'd fallen into a hole, abrupt and frightening, that she'd thought she was losing him one way while not seeing that there was a much more dangerous and lasting way to lose him she hadn't even known to worry about. 

Through all of that, she became aware of her own evolution. When Tony handed her the reigns, she stepped up to the plate with a capability she hadn't realized she had until she took the leap of faith. She recognized then a shrewdness, an intelligence that she hadn't used before so it took her a while to recognize. She was good at this. She was better than good; she was epic. Under her hand, the company that Tony had built and created became something _more_ and it helped people. 

The strength her own abilities gave her and the new levels she experienced emotionally when she and Tony finally started dating were no panaceas. Her strength failed her, at times. At times she made mistakes, both in the professional and in their dating life, but she loved fiercely. She sacrificed without complaint, she appreciated and had gratitude for every moment of it, good or bad.

The Tony she got back from the wormhole seemed wholly different creature to her, at times, and she despised herself for it. It was Tony. Her Tony. Badly shaken, perhaps. Difficult to say, because he'd pushed her away in ways he never had before even when he was dying. 

He had his nightmares and she had hers.

He was an Iron Man armor wearing Tony's skin. He was not him. He was an alien, an alien had killed him. Loki had tricked them again with a stranger with Tony's face, his look, but his fear was not his own. A repulsor blast from his chest would burn her as she embraced him and she'd scream but it was his body that turned to ashes in her arms. 

"Tony!" She was screaming but of course it was a dream, a nightmare, so it felt as if she were suffocating, muffled, couldn't move couldn't scream couldn't save him or herself.

"I've got, I've got you, I'm here. Come back Pepper, wake up honey. It's not real, it's not real." Slowly the black-red haze of terror, fear, burning cracked with the blue-white light of the arc reactor, faded into confusion. Disoriented, she suddenly lashed out, grasping at the hands, the arms around her with incredible strength.

"It's okay honey," Tony said. She snapped fully awake at his tone; the one he got when he was hurting, was in pain but trying to hide it. It was her. She was hurting him. She was too strong now, holding him too tightly. She let go as if flame-bitten.

"Tony, I'm sorry!" She said in a panic, her hands fluttering helplessly as she wanted to hold him and comfort him but also was afraid of hurting him again, and a choking sob of horror rose up in her throat, choking her, and that reminded her forcefully of Killian's killing grip on her neck when he'd kidnapped her and all she felt was terror and all she saw was darkness.

"It's okay, it's okay," Tony said soothingly, his voice aching but differently now, he was worried about her now. "Honey I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry." His arms were around her, she felt now, felt the familiar cool, hard arc reactor against her side as he pressed her close. His strong, callused but graceful hand stroked her hair. 

For a moment as brief as a flash of lightning, almost too fast to register, she hated him. Hated him for loving her when she was like this, loving her anyway. For being so kind when she didn't want it, for being there for her no matter what because she knew it hurt him, she'd probably nearly broke his _arm_ and he didn't complain or walk away and somehow it made her so _angry_ \--

Then she felt regret and guilt and bitter, bitter shame. The emotional whiplash of terror to guilt twisted her stomach, wrenching it painfully in a spasm and she was going to throw up but then she felt the Extremis virus. 

The sensation that provoked silenced everything else, like birds in the presence of a predator. She heard Tony gasp and loosen his hold on her but he didn't let go. She opened her eyes and the orange-yellow glow of her skin, bright and dying at the same moment like a sunset, against the cool blue of the arc reactor's light, hurt her eyes, left black spots floating in her vision. The nausea faded instantly, and then the Extremis light died and she felt it move within her like a beast falling asleep. She shuddered.

He walked her to the kitchen, still limping on his ankle injured in the fight with Killian, and didn't say a word, just made her a mug of hot chocolate the way she liked it, way too sweet. He sat beside her and she drank it and started to relax, until finally she was relaxed enough to realize how tense he was. His muscles were tight as if he were holding a terrible weight in his arms, his shoulders, his back. She could see how tense he was; she reached out and put a hand on his shoulder and it was like a rock. It was like iron. He was suffering and so was she. What a pair they made! Even thought they'd come through relatively unscathed, it was clear to her now that they were only beginning to move forward and that healing might not come for a long time. 

For now, it was enough to remember they were together, they were safe. He managed to get her laughing, snide and snarky comments, they way only he could as he lead her back to bed. He stroked her hair until she fell back asleep.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bruce is helping :)

When she woke, Tony was gone. Unsurprising. He had such a hard time sleeping, and he was obsessed now with figuring out Extremis. No doubt JARVIS was already alerting him that she was awake and she'd only just opened her eyes, taking in the beautiful view of New York City. The Malibu mansion's view of the ocean was pretty and she missed it, but that was destroyed and here was not. Here was safe, or at least safer. She preferred Avenger's Tower and New York, in all honesty, but Tony preferred the open spaces, the clear horizon, the unfettered freedom of the ocean and she was happy there too. But to her, here was better.

She sat up slowly, expecting to ache, as one did after an illness or injury. But there was no wound on her body, no injury, no fever. She expected her skin to fall off in black strips of burned flesh. She expected her singed hair to smell and curl as if writhing in pain, she expected her hands to claw as her flesh melted around her bones, she expected her clothes to scrape against the raw nerves of her flesh in tattered and blackened mockery of the finery she usually wore.

But they didn't. Her perfectly ordinary, simple body functioned nearly as it always did. Very nearly. She stood and stretched and cautiously ran her hands down her arms, over her rib cage, checking for fever, for pain. Nothing. Experimentally walked over to a heavy bookshelf, full of beautiful but thick leatherbound volumes of law books that Tony had gotten when he was studying law for himself to understand the legal aspects of his business. Bracing her legs, she shoved the bookshelf as hard as she could, not expecting to be able to budge it at all.

It flew across the room with explosive force, slamming so hard against the wall that the shelf shattered, the books tearing apart with the force of the impact, and the wall buckled, leaving a large indent the size of the oversized bookcase. Pepper's hands flew over her mouth, shock and fear seizing her body.

Tony came flying in the room, halting in the doorway in equal shock as he took in the scene. There was a panicked look on his face as he thought about calling a suit but realized he didn't have one; they'd all been destroyed three days before. He went through the motions, called out to JARVIS who responded but no one heard what he said, and Tony was helpless and then the moment of panic passed as he realized there was no threat _to_ Pepper, Pepper _was_ the threat. She had collapsed to the ground, her hand over her mouth, with her eyes closed tightly. 

"Honey... Pep?" He went and kneeled beside her, his hands, covered in bruises, hovered over her anxiously. He didn't know what to do, didn't know what she needed, didn't know if she wanted him there or needed him or if she would put him through a wall.

She opened her eyes and looked at him and as soon as he saw her beautiful blue eyes, his shoulders relaxed and he put his hands on her shoulders and drew her close. It was her. She was her, his Pepper. "Hey, honey. Hey. It's okay. Didn't know your own strength, right? Next time I'll have you work out in the Hulk-out room, okay?" In his relief a chuckle shivered through his words, but he wasn't really laughing. He was just happy she was all right, or at least as all right as she could be. 

When he heard the crash in the hallway he'd been terrified that she'd exploded. He'd seen it in Killian's videos, countless times as he watched them for any clue how to help Pepper, and he wished he hadn't. He should have had JARVIS analyze the videos because now he couldn't get the images out of his head, nor the fear out of his heart. Though she was out of phase two, the most dangerous time when the body could still reject Extremis, her body was still volatile, still foreign, still dangerous. At any time, anyone with Extremis in their body could explode if they could not "regulate" as Maya phrased it in her papers, but he wasn't entirely clear what it meant or even if Maya knew. 

"Tony? Are you guys all right?" Bruce was standing in the doorway, looking as usual like a lost puppy in an oversized sweater. 

Pepper steadied herself and sat up, forstalling Tony's hands, pushing them away. "Yeah," she said bitingly. "We're fine in here Bruce. I accidentally destroyed the wall, though. And the books. And the bookshelf."

"I see." Bruce came closer, tentatively offering her a small smile and grasping her arm to gently help her stand. She returned the smile shakily.

"I didn't know that would happen. Sorry." She directed this last word at Tony, though predictably he flinched; it bothered him badly when she apologized when he felt responsible for not keeping her safe, keeping her out of Killian's hands. He'd told her he wouldn't put her in danger again and that's exactly what he'd done by telling her to take Maya Hansen and run. And he hadn't come back for her, he hadn't known, hadn't seen his true enemy in time and all this was his fault. She saw his hands shake as he ran them over his face.

"Don't worry about it, Pep, all those books are out of date anyway. I'm due for an upgrade in here too, I didn't like the paint color," he said off-hand, putting his arm around her. She leaned into him, breathing in the scent of his shampoo, his aftershave, _him_. It comforted her. It was for her. Others might smell it too, but not many, and it wasn't for them. It was her smell, the one that made her happy, the one that was Tony. "Hungry?" His fingers tightened around her arm and she let him press her against his chest, feeling the pressure of their togetherness.

She made a face. She wasn't much of a breakfast person; it was typically too sweet and too early. But the Extremis serum had an odd side effect; she was always hungry. It consumed, it devoured. Pepper enjoyed eating healthy and liked to exercise and had been more concerned with being healthy than with maintaining a certain weight but-- the fact was. She could eat anything she wanted at the moment and not gain an ounce. She was hungry enough to consume thousands of calories a day but her slender frame hadn't added so much as an ounce. 

"Sure. Yes. Food." 

"While Tony's cooking, do you mind coming down to the lab?" Bruce asked, his warm brown eyes studying her intently. "I can get some blood tests cooking and grab some vital signs. Make sure you're doing all right." She shivered, though she wasn't cold. Hadn't been cold since the first injection. 

"Yeah, that's fine," she replied, though it wasn't. None of this was fine. How could she be this strong, this powerful, be this invulnerable and yet this terrified? This helpless? This unhappy? 

Bruce needed a haircut, she noticed, as Tony gave her hand another squeeze before he headed to the kitchen and she headed to the lab. It wasn't overly long, yet, but his curls were a bit unruly. He'd been quiet since he arrived two days ago. He was, as always, pleasantly sad, benevolently distant, politely shy. He had been the first to call her when the Mandarin had destroyed the mansion, offered to come, said he would be on his way, but there was nothing for any of them to do but wait. She liked Bruce, she liked all the Avengers, but she hadn't allowed any of them to come to the mansion. When Steve had called and then Clint and Natasha, she'd told them Rhodey would keep them apprised of needs. 

Maybe she should have let Natasha come stay with her when she'd offered. 

In her defense, she'd had no way to know she'd be kidnapped, tortured, used as a hostage, and fall to her supposed death.

She stumbled, not paying close enough attention to navigate the cluttered lab, and Bruce caught her arm to steady her, seeing the anxiety in her face. "Careful," he said softly.

"Will you... will you check on Tony's ankle later? I'm sure he hurt it running down the hall like that. He should be on his crutches still--"

"You know Tony," Bruce replied softly. She twisted her mouth. Yeah. She did.

She lowered herself into a chair by the blood draw supplies. Bruce sat on a rolling stool and moved in front of her, giving her a tight, regretful smile. "How are you, Pepper?"

"I feel fine, Bruce."

"That's... that's good. I'm really glad to hear that." He paused taking her wrist to count her pulse, feeling it throb gently against his, a soft and gentle nudge against his fingertips that said _life, life, life._ He paused as he felt a familiar swell of anger; no matter how hard he tried, anger always came first, in response to everything, then it settled into something more appropriate-- sadness for everything she and Tony had gone through. He could feel the Other Guy, but only barely, only just, like a bird casting a shadow as it flew by. The anger came and went and he felt sad.

Tony Stark. He'd crossed academic circles with him many times. Though their fields of science were vastly different, there were areas that intersected and he was familiar with a lot of Stark's work. That was all before Bruce had hidden himself away. It had been years since he'd read up on anything, years since he'd valued his life in any meaningful way. He'd itched with fear, he'd spiraled into deep depression, he'd lost everything he'd ever cared about. 

And then Tony Stark. He'd been taken aback and somewhat bewildered by the manic billionaire, at first, but as the two of them spent time in the lab trying to locate Loki and the tesseract, he'd found himself... amused. For the first time in a long time. He smiled, though he hadn't quite brought himself to laugh. And he'd really enjoyed having someone who understood him on a scientific level.

There had been a moment, too, when Tony had taken Bruce Banner in-- his mannerisms, his self-deprecation, his tone, all of it, and read something into it that he didn't like. And instead of blowing it off or awkwardly ignoring it, he'd told Bruce he thought the gamma radiation should have killed him and he must be alive for a reason. Said they would find out. In the middle of the nightmare that Loki had created, Tony had given Bruce something he'd thought himself incapable of-- a glimmer of hope.

He'd never, he'd _never_ before that moment thought of the Hulk in any possible positive way. It was a terrible, terrible curse; it had cost him everything. It was worse than death, just as inescapable. He felt marked. He'd hurt people against his will. He had to live with it, every day, forever. He'd never be able to have any kind of relationship with another human being. No friends, no family, no partners. Before him stretched a long road of loneliness, pain, fear, and despair. 

Don't forget anger. There was always that.

But that was before Tony. Not only had he changed his perspective on the Hulk, he'd befriended the lonely scientist. Tony hadn't asked for friendship. He hadn't tiptoed, hadn't worried, had just assumed, apparently unconcerned or uncaring about why it might be a bad idea to be friends with Bruce Banner. He had befriended Bruce as easily as he did anything he put his not inconsiderable talents to. His lack of fear made Bruce less angry. The Hulk _liked_ Tony. It was a bizarre, nightmarish thing, that he had something in common with the thing within him he hated most and would literally die to get rid of. Liking, then caring about, Tony Stark. And when that came, another thing came with it-- a desire to help other people. 

Together.

Bruce would have thought the end of the world more likely than him having anything in common with Hulk. He _hated_ Hulk, and the Hulk hated him. (Well, Hulk hated everything, basically. Everything enraged him, anyway.) It would be like Tony teaming up with the Ten Rings, or Captain America with Hydra. 

Except those things were evil, and Bruce was learning, thanks to Tony, that Hulk wasn't evil.

Bruce, by having that inside him, wasn't evil.

"I'm glad you feel fine, but it's not really what I meant," he said gently to the pretty red-head. "But if you don't want to talk to me about it, it's okay."

Pepper looked up at him quickly, but he had turned away to write down her vitals. He turned back and took her temperature. "It's not that I don't want to talk about it. I guess... I'm not sure how I'm doing. How am I supposed to be doing? I don't hurt physically, even though I keep expecting to. I'm guessing a lot of what I'm feeling is normal? But it sucks? So fine just about covers it, I guess?"

"You might be right when you put it that way," Bruce said with a note of good humor. He paused, taking off his glasses. "Tony told me you had a nightmare last night?"

Pepper closed her eyes. "I don't know why my nightmares are still about losing Tony. Or he's not real, or it looks like him but it's not him. That he died and I killed him. After everything I've been through, I guess losing him is still my biggest fear."

"It was only a week or so ago that you thought he'd died," Bruce reminded her. "And considering his occupation, it's not the only time you've had to worry about it." 

Bruce didn't watch the news. He'd learned early on that it made him anxious and, like all his emotions, anxious was only a hair's breath away from angry. But he'd been at a grocery store and seen the newspaper headlines-- "Mandarin Attack: Stark Presumed Dead." He'd heard about the Mandarin, everyone had, but he hadn't heard about Happy. He didn't know about Tony's threat. He'd literally dropped everything, leaving all his groceries on the floor to run home to call Pepper, who had answered on the first ring and spent twenty minutes explaining everything that had happened. 

He'd felt punched in the gut. It had taken a few minutes to calm down; he could feel himself turning shades of green. 

Hulk had remembered catching the falling Iron Man. It was a surprisingly vivid, coherent thought from the creature. Normally, Bruce only remembered in glimpses, in impressions the things the unintelligent Hulk saw and experienced. But a moment, a feeling of flight, then he caught his ally but even Hulk could tell something was terribly wrong; no movement, no life, no light, and he felt _fear,_ and this from a being that only ever felt rage, which came a moment later when Hulk was _angry_ that Iron Man was dead. When Tony Stark opened his eyes at Hulk's roar of rage, a jolt connected Hulk and Bruce. A jolt of relief and happiness that their friend was alive.

When Tony had called him two days ago, he'd assumed it was to touch bases with his old teammate and give him a debriefing on the portions that might relate to the Avengers. 

At first Tony had sounded like his normal, upbeat, manic self, describing things at a rate of a million words a minute, jumping from subject to subject, telling nothing linearly. He said something about destroying all his suits and Pepper and he hadn't properly understood because it sounded like he said Pepper had fallen into flames and fought an Iron Man armor but that made no sense--

And then Tony's words had all stumbled into each other and he'd finally stopped talking. It was abrupt and Bruce called into the phone. "Tony? Tony, did I lose you?"

"Very nearly," Tony had replied after a few more seconds, and Bruce heard the brokenness, the hurt in his friend's voice. 

"I blew up the suits, Bruce."

"What suits, Tony?"

"The Iron Man ones. I destroyed them, all 42. Even Romeo, and he was pretty cool, and Bones and Red Snapper and Igor--"

"Tony, Tony, what the hell are you talking about?? You had _42_ suits??"

" _Because_ Bruce, I was creating suits instead of getting help. So I destroyed them. And now I'm asking for help." Bruce had leaned back, trying to absorb everything Tony had told him. 

"Okay, Tony, what kind of help? Of course I'll help you, what do you need?"

"The bastard injected Pepper with some serum. It increases strength and healing but has some unfortunate side effects. All the bombings? It was people not bombs."

"Wait. What?"

"Listen, Bruce, I need your help figuring this Extremis thing out and it will be a lot easier to explain once you're here. Will you come? I'll send you some literature to read on your way over. Can you stay here a while? It's okay if you can't. It's short notice. Maybe I shouldn't have asked."

"Tony I'll be there, okay? Okay? I'll stay, yeah, of course. The mansion is wrecked, though? Where are you?"

"I was in the process of building this tower in New York. It's not completely finished but most of the floors are done, at least they're livable. I'll probably make some adjustments now, anyway. The Hulk-out room is done, so that's actually good. I've gotten most of the medical equipment sent over, and the lab is fully functional. But--"

"The... the what?" Bruce asked bewildered. "The Hulk-out room? Wha-- You know what, never mind. Just tell me where to go and you can explain when I get there."

"Head to the airport Brucie Bear," Tony said easily. "I'll have a plane waiting for you. See you in a few hours."

Now he was sitting across from Pepper Potts, whom he'd only met at a couple of dinners before. It was hard for him, awkward as he was, to see the couple as they tried to weather this crisis together. But if there was anyone who understood how Pepper might be feeling at the moment, it was Bruce. 

"I'll never stop worrying about him, will I?" She whispered, the tiredness she hadn't felt in her body settling deep into her soul. Her heart was tired. 

"Probably not," Bruce answered reluctantly. "But... I guess that goes for anyone you care a lot about." He took the blood pressure cuff off her arm and started looking for a vein. Within a few minutes, he'd taken the blood he needed and was setting it in the machines for analysis. JARVIS started displaying initial findings on a heads-up hologram display and Bruce studied them, comparing them to the results from the last few days. 

He glanced over at Pepper. "I'm all done with you for now, Pepper. You can head to the kitchen, I'll join you and Tony in a few minutes."

"Thanks, Bruce," she whispered. 

"Pepper?" She looked back at him. "It will be okay." He nodded to her, reassuring but sad. She smiled in return and went upstairs.


	3. Chapter 3

"But that is not accounting for the random molecular chaos, Tony," Bruce said, keeping his voice calm and reasonable. "I don't think--"

"Did you just? Tell me? To account for random molecular chaos?" Tony asked in disbelief. "No no no no. Look again at this formula. Check it against the simulation, Bruce! Look here."

"I see it, Tony, I really do. I understand that you're trying to mimic absolute zero and by bombarding the molecules you're hoping to decrease the rate of entropy that was causing, in part, the instability of Extremis. However, we have to account for the effect of change on an internal energy system." 

"I have Maya's calculations right here!" Tony said in exasperation. "She _tried that_ already, it didn't work."

"Sir," JARVIS said quietly. "I do hate to interrupt, but I believe it would be prudent to check on Miss Potts." Tony's breath hitched as he looked up at the camera, already moving toward the exit. "She's all right but appears to be in some kind of distress. Her vital signs are altered, at 23% increase from baseline in her heart rate and blood pressure." Tony had given her a watch to wear that monitored her vital signs at all times. "She's presently in the common area. Perhaps you should accompany him, Dr. Banner," JARVIS suggested when Bruce hesitated, uncertain.

Tony rushed as quickly as he could on his injured ankle. He'd formed a brace of his own design that should keep the joint immobile and aid in healing, but it still hurt and it still slowed him down. He went into the common roomm, his own heart rate up. But he couldn't see Pepper. He took a breath in to ask JARVIS where she'd gone when he saw a large pile of blankets on the couch move slightly. He swallowed then walked over and knelt beside the couch, lifting a corner of the blanket carefully. Wrong end. It uncovered her feet, making her curl her toes. 

Tony smiled faintly then scooted to the other end, lifting the opposite corner. Pepper peered up at him, pale beneath her freckles, her blue eyes large and sleepy. "Tony?" She closed her eyes.

"Hey Pepper. How are you doing?"

"I got cold." That must have been some kind of an understatement. Even with the afternoon sun streaming through the large windows making the room several degrees warmer than the rest of the floor, Tony could feel the heat pouring out from the blankets like an oven. Three down comforters. Was she... was she laying on a heating blanket? Tony felt fear grasp at his chest.

Pepper moved to pull the blanket down but he brushed her hand away and his heart started pounding at how hot her hand felt. He reached down and touched her forehead. It was burning, burning, burning hot. Pepper was burning. He turned her hand so he could read the watch on her slender wrist. In the area for temperature, it just read "high."

He allowed himself a few moments of fear, his chest heaving with his effort to control his breathing. Then he steadied himself. He'd done it before. Pepper needed him. "JARVIS," he said with deathly calm. "Read Pepper's temperature." It took a moment as JARVIS estimated her temperature factoring in environmental interference. 

"Miss Pott's current temperature is 109.3, sir," JARVIS said with restrained alarm. 

He glanced at Bruce, who looked startled and quickly stumbled toward the kitchen to the freezer. Tony turned back to Pepper, pulling the blankets away. She protested, grasping at the blankets half-heartedly. He watched Extremis, beautiful and deadly, flicker orange and yellow under her skin then disappear.

"Nope," he said, pulling the blanket out of her hand. "Come here, sweetie, you've got a fever we've got to get these blankets off you, you're getting um... you're too warm." Pepper blearily opened her eyes and offered little resistance to him aside from a small whine.

"No, _don't_ Tony, I'm cold!" 

"I know," he said with a soft grunt, lifting her into his arms. She shivered violently, snuggling against him. 

"You're like an ice cube," she muttered, putting her arms around his neck, pressing against him, trying for warmth. "I can walk. Where are we going?"

"Just to the lab. I um... I think I'll just carry you, honey." He was afraid now to let her go. She was burning in his arms, painfully hot, and his ankle hurt like hell. 

She kind of seemed out of it, too, not very concerned with anything. She seemed like she was falling back to sleep in his arms. JARVIS opened the lab doors for him and he carried her to the small bed near the medical equipment he and Bruce had been working near. Bruce came in a few minutes later with a large bowl of ice, picking up some ice packs from the medical supplies cupboard and filling them up. 

"Hang on, hang on," Tony said, waving a hand at him. "Come here." Bruce stepped over quickly, putting his glasses on. Tony extricated his hand from Pepper's and took two steps to a stack of papers which he grabbed before stepping back to be beside Pepper. "It's in here somewhere, dammit. Something about a high fever during phase three." He started shuffling through them frantically, nearly dropping them before Bruce came over and gently took the papers from his shaking hands. 

"I think I remember. It said... it said there was a malignant hyperthermic effect in 6% of subjects, right? And trying to cool them too quickly caused a reflex vasodilation and muscle spasms, increasing the temperature even more. Here it is. They started giving the subjects dantrolene to counteract the effect."

"I don't have any of that. I'll have to call someone to get it fast. JARVIS--"

"I am already calling the nearest hospitals, sir, to request access to the drug."

"They're not just going to give it to you without a prescription or something," Bruce protested.

"Uh, sorry Bruce. I forgot to tell you. When you agreed to come help with all this, I had JARVIS get you prescriptive and admitting privileges at the local hospitals just in case. I should have done it sooner really. But I probably should have asked you. Or told you. Since it's in your name and everything."

"It's fine," Bruce said faintly. Having worked closely with Tony the last few days and during the alien invasion, it shouldn't surprise him much anymore how the brilliant man's mind worked. Still, he often found himself surprised. Tony's mind always seemed to be ten steps ahead.

"The drug will be delivered by courier no sooner than an hour from now, sir," JARVIS said quietly. Tony looked angry for a moment, then his face dissolved into something more like grief, and fear. Bruce stepped to his friend and put a hand on his shoulder.

"It's going to be okay, Tony. This says that the fever only got dangerous over 115 degrees and for more than three hours. We'll have the drug by then. We'll keep a close eye on her temperature."

"I only..." his voice was hushed, almost not quite shaking. "I only made the watch measure a temperature to 107. I should have... I should have thought--" He slumped beside the bed, pushing Pepper's hair away from her face. She was so hot, it was actually uncomfortable to touch her. 

"What are we going to do?" Bruce almost didn't hear; Tony had buried his head in his arm. 

"We'll give her the dantrolene. Her fever will ease. And you, me, and JARVIS will try the experiment with the entropic effects of your calculation. We'll get this, Tony. We already got this. It's just a matter of time."

"Yeah, right," Tony said, raising his head. "And every minute of that time is Pepper suffering 'cause I-- I didn't keep her safe and I haven't figured this out yet."

Bruce didn't say anything, frowning deeply. He knew, all too well, how self-recrimination worked. It never worked when Betty or anyone else told him things weren't his fault. It wasn't Tony's fault, but it wasn't Bruce that needed to know that, and Tony couldn't believe it until he was ready and wanted to. 

Tony wasn't waiting for an answer anyway. He had picked up the papers, shuffling through them, muttering to himself. He shoved them at Bruce, grabbing at a coffee cup, looking distractedly at Pepper. The cup crashed to the ground, shattering. 

"Damn it." Bruce set the papers down and knelt down to help Tony clean up the cup. 

"Here, I got this. Maybe do put some ice on Pepper, huh? Under her arms. Maybe get her hair wet. JARVIS, cool room to 65 degrees. Monitor Miss Potts temperature and alert us if it's going up."

"Yes doctor," JARVIS replied.

Tony hadn't moved. Bruce threw away the coffee cup and sopped up the remnants of the coffee and then crouched down beside the troubled genius. Neither of them spoke.

Finally, Tony looked up at him, his face laid bare with pain and grief. Bruce hadn't seen him like this, ever, even after the Hulk had saved him. He was always strong, always joking, always thinking and ten steps ahead of the rest of them. Bruce frowned slightly, seeing for the first time that his friend was going through more than he'd been letting on. Tony was afraid. That in itself wasn't too worrisome, but Bruce had seen, many times, the disastrous results of an intelligent person with unlimited resources who acted from a place of fear. He was starting to wonder more about what Tony had meant when he said he'd made all the suits instead of getting help. 

Pepper stirred, curling into a ball on the bed. Tony shook his head slightly, his grief and fear were gone from his face in the next instant, as he went to her, pulling a blanket over her. "Enjoy that," he said to her. "I'm going to put some ice on you in a second."

"That'd be mean," Pepper muttered, not opening her eyes. After a moment of his silence in response, she forced her eyes open. "What's wrong, Tony? It's okay, I'll fix it for you."

"Nothing for you to fix this time, honey," he murmured. "I'll have to try and save you this time."

He'd failed to protect her-- too many times. He'd needed her help-- all too often. The fact that she was so sick and afraid and still seeking his comfort and well-being made him feel sick inside. It put a seed of doubt in his mind, in his soul. Maybe... maybe he wasn't a good thing for Pepper. Maybe she loved him and he loved her but maybe that wasn't enough. Maybe that wasn't good enough. He didn't have time to examine that particular feeling; even if it were true, he couldn't imagine his life without her and did not have strength at the moment to contemplate what it might mean. 

He had to pull himself together and figure out Extremis. He had to stop overthinking. He had to-- he had... had to--

"Tony?" Bruce put his hand on Tony's shoulder. Tony shuddered then refocused.

"Dantrolene. What do you know about it?"

"Uh... I don't know. It's been a while. It's a ryanodine receptor antagonist, it prevents the release of calcium. Something like that, why? Should I look it up?"

"No no no I'm just thinking." Pepper had fallen asleep and didn't so much as stir when he placed icepacks under her arms, on her neck. 

He looked down at her, amazed at her abject strength and yet vulnerability; he could see her pulse beating in her throat. He could see her veins. He could see her muscles move as she stirred; her chest rise and fall with her breathing; her hair fall across the pillow. He could feel the warmth of her feverish body.

He knew now what it would be like to lose her; he had felt it in all it's horrifying reality just before she took out Killian herself. She was so strong; she'd taken out an armor with a gauntlet and her own rage, yet here she was, Extremis lending its strength to her while also threatening her life at any moment.

He was thinking. He was thinking he could tinker a bit with the medicine. Perhaps if there was a component compatible with the theoretical model he'd already put in place, it could be the key to making the whole thing work.

However, he'd come to an important decision. Pepper had suffered enough because of Extremis. He had an idea but he was going to have to get Bruce out of the lab for it to work..

...  
"Tony. _Tony!_ Come down here a minute, will you."

"Rhodey, good to see you but get the hell out of here, I'm busy. I'm on a clock here."

"Oh it's going to be like that?"

"Is it ever...? Not? Like that? I'm not kidding, though, go away."

"It actually is important, you idiot. Don't you think I have better things to do than hang around you all day? Believe me, I do." Tony gave a last twist of a wrench on a bolt he was tightening then jumped off the counter where he'd been standing.

"What is that?" Rhodey asked suspiciously. He'd hadn't witnessed the catastrophic destruction of all the armors first hand; he'd been getting the president to safety but he'd heard about it. Tony was supposed to be laying off making armors.

"What's it look like?" Tony replied irritably. "It's an Iron Man armor, I had to make a new one since the others all blew up. For emergencies. No offense but if it's important why are we standing around asking stupid questions?"

"I can ask all the questions I want when you're the one being stupid, Tony. Where's Bruce?"

"I sent him to bed three hours ago."

"When's the last time you slept?"

"I swear to Loki that if you don't quit bugging me I'll put this suit on and carry you out myself. Those override passcodes are just for an emergency not because you got bored or lonely. I'm working. I've got to get Extremis figured out, Rhodes and no offense but you're just distracting me."

"I'm sure you're thinking that food and water and sleep are just distractions too?" He heard Tony take in a frustrated breath but wouldn't answer him this time, instead getting back to work on the armor. "It doesn't look like you're working on Extremis to me."

"Shows what you know," Tony shot back, wiping his sweaty forehead on his arm. "For your information, I ate this morning. I slept last night when Pepper's fever was down. And this has everything to do with Extremis."

"Tony, do you think you're going to fool me or something? I _know_ you man. I know your whole M.O. I know that exact look on your face, I've seen it a million times. You're so damn predictable Tony, and you think you're smart but you're not smarter than me when it comes to this."

"Rhodey. Dear. Platypus. I have no freaking idea what you're supposed to be talking about."

"Getting Bruce out of the lab. Pepper too. You know, it's awfully suspicious when JARVIS is suddenly not forthcoming with updates on your progress, genius. But even without all that, I can tell by the look on your face you're about to do something dangerous and self-destructive."

"Asinine extrapolation aside, you couldn't be more wronger."

Rhodey stepped in front of Tony, blocking him as he was limping toward a workbench, then moving in front of him again when Tony tried to go around him. Tony shook his head angrily.

"What, Rhodes? You're seriously pissing me off."

"Bruce Banner told me six hours ago that you thought you might have a way to stabilize Extremis. But Pepper is sleeping in bed, not stabilized. Right? I have a bad feeling, Tony. So does Bruce. He said you shoved him out of here."

"Bruce Banner tattletale," Tony replied, rolling his eyes. "First of all, it wasn't shoving. Second of all, I happened to have shoved him out because he needed to sleep before he hulked out and killed me. And yes, I do think we figured it out but it takes some time to be sure. I'm not giving a second experimental drug to the woman I love."

"So what are you planning Tony? Forget I asked, I already know. Are you planning on injecting yourself with Extremis?"

"Nope."

Rhodey stepped back, surprised. "Oh."

Tony wiped his forehead again. "I already did," he admitted without looking up, and to Rhodey's further surprise, Tony looked flushed. The man was never flustered, embarrassed, or at all discombobulated no matter what he faced. It was clear to Rhodey that Tony wasn't sure he'd done the wisest thing. He was maybe afraid.

James Rhodes stared at his best friend, his heart sinking. He knew he should be angry. It would be more than justified. Tony had put him through a lot, and constantly seemed to be pushing him away when he should be confiding in him and allowing him to help him. 

But Rhodey had learned something a long time ago. It didn't pay to hate someone for who they were, fundamentally, as a person. You either accepted it and dealt with it, or you cut them loose. But resenting and being angry at someone for being the way they were was never the option to take. When he'd met Tony at MIT, he'd been a conceited, arrogant, brash little jerk. But he'd been kind then, too. Thoughtful. If presented with a friend's problem, he'd set all his not inconsiderable powers to solving it. He'd try his best to make things better, easier for others. He was generous without thought, kind without seeking praise, compassionate without seeking anything in return. And yes, even then, he'd often been a self-destructive, passive-aggressive, selfish. Even as a kid, he would have too much too drink, sleep with too many women, go too long without sleep, too much caffeine, he had too many brains, too much intelligence, too much passion, he was too much and Rhodey loved him the way he was. He had grown up but all of those tendencies were still there, a part of who Tony was, and he loved Tony. He didn't take his crap, but he didn't expect him to stop being who he was.

He didn't expect him to change. 

He let Tony's news sink in for a moment, waiting to see if he would be angry after all. But he wasn't. He felt sad, and he felt afraid. He'd seen first hand the destructive power of Extremis. He'd already almost lost Tony when Killian had bombed the Malibu mansion. This seemed... it was a lot. He closed his eyes, shaking his head slightly.

"How can I help?" He asked finally. Tony looked up at him quickly, then Rhodey watched Tony's face crumple and his wrench clattered to the ground as he dropped it to cover his face, his shoulders heaving as he struggled to breathe and control his emotions.

"Damn it Rhodey," he choked. He opened his mouth to speak again, but he couldn't. He couldn't speak at all.


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Note: the end of this chapter is somewhat of a rehash of the end of Iron Man 3, I hope it's not too boring. What Pepper and Tony were going through, what they were thinking, mostly from Pepper's perspective. Thank you for those who have commented and encouraged me, and thank you for being patient as it took longer than usual to update this fic.

_Until then it's just a lot of pain._

Tony jerked awake, knocking something glass off the nightstand, grasping for... what? A weapon, but there was none. He was helpless. Somehow, he was in his bed, asleep when Pepper was in danger but it was so confusing, he couldn't remember... but Pepper was in danger, so he stumbled out of bed, his knees hitting the ground painfully. The armor was broken? No, he'd destroyed it? No, no that was a nightmare when that happened, he had an armor, there was one. "JARVIS?"

Static and garbled gibberish answered him, a harsh scraping sound like an old dial-up internet trying to connect. The room spun crazily as if he were flying, as if he were falling. But he was too heavy, he couldn't fly, the armor was failing and his body jerked as when you miss a step, when you begin to fall, when you reach a tipping point and then you go over it, slipping, out of control. His vision turned red, everything was red, his skin was red was it his eyes or his skin that was wrong--

He woke up again, this time for real. It took him a moment to realize he was in a lot of pain. It had woken him up, it had made him afraid. If he was hurting, he was in danger, and that made Pepper in danger, maybe others. A grogginess filled his mind that couldn't be accounted for by mere sleepiness; he couldn't think, he couldn't move--

"Easy," a sweet voice said, authoritative but gentle. "Careful. I've got you." _I got you first,_ he thought, but he hadn't. He hadn't saved her. He couldn't move because strong arms were holding him down, preventing him from escaping, from hurting himself. He tried to think, to clear his head, but it was the pain. He wasn't groggy, he was hurting, the pain was making it hard to think, but it didn't feel real, it felt like a nightmare, he felt drugged. Had he been drugged? 

He'd drugged himself, the Extremis, the exploding plant, the exploding people, the exploding everything, _five shadows, six souls, one didn't go to heaven, you buy that? That's what people say._

"Pepper," he croaked, weakly pushing her hands away. But she was strong now, actually she'd always been the strong one, people never saw that-- "Honey. I'm so sorry you hurt like this. I'm... Pep, I'm so sorry." He felt the arms go still around him and heard her soft sigh.

"Oh Tony."

He forced his eyes open and everything was on fire. Flames licked gently across his vision, he could feel the heat, the burning. "Oh." He realized it was something wrong with his vision; Extremis affected the eyes, of course it did, it affected everything, every cell of the body.

"Can't you just give him the damn cure?" A voice demanded, angry and authoritative, that's Rhodey 98% of the time he opens his mouth. 

"It's complicated," he heard Bruce reply calmly. "It's not really a cure. It just stabilizes it and mitigates the effects, but there's no way to remove it from the body. He and Pepper will always have it, just in an inactive state."

"Okay, fine. Why can't you give him _that,_ then?"

"I would if I could," Bruce said patiently but with an edge of exasperation now. "His body will have to accept the Extremis virus in order to receive the cure. Right now it would kill him. He needs Extremis in order to survive the cure for Extremis. Don't you think I'd have given it to him if it were safe?"

A pause. "Yeah," Rhodey said with a sigh. "Okay, you're right Dr. Banner, I apologize. It's hard to see them like this."

"Believe me, Colonel Rhodes, I understand," Bruce said dryly. "I should have realized what he would do--"

"It wasn't your fault Dr. Banner," Pepper said firmly in her CEO voice, and no one argued with her when she used it, not even Tony but mostly because it made him laugh when she bossed people around, when she swept through a board meeting or a shareholder's meeting like a strong wind in Stilleto heels. "It doesn't do anyone any good to take responsibility for someone else's actions, however well-intentioned they might be."

"Fair enough," Bruce acceded quietly. "But I wish I'd known. I wish I'd stopped him."

Tony didn't hear this part of the conversation. Pepper felt his body go rigid in her arms, felt him take a breath then cry out harshly in pain, as if stabbed or shot. He tried to push her away, incoherent again, his skin turning dangerously orange with the mottled flames raging within his body, cracking across his face like fault lines.

"Get out James, right now!" Bruce said sharply and he came over to Tony and Pepper, his own eyes clear, anxious, helpless. Rhodes left quickly, reluctantly, but he was not invulnerable and Pepper had only allowed him in the lab if he agreed to leave immediately if he was told to and he'd readily agreed. Monitor alarms blared harshly and loudly, demanding attention.

"Tony, Tony. Can you hear me? Don't fight the pain so hard, sweetheart, that makes it... that makes it worse." Pepper stroked back his hair from his sweaty forehead as he squirmed in pain as she held him, tears falling silently down her cheeks. He'd been through this. He'd had to watch her. She hated this, she'd rather go through it again herself than watch him, she hated him so much for doing this, hated him deeply and burningly and if he lived through this she was definitely going to kill him and leave him and scream at him and smash his belongings if he would just survive, if he would just pull through and if she could manage to let him go long enough. She pressed her cheek against his forehead as Bruce scrambled to help restrain him, grabbing his wrist, but Bruce was not strong enough and Hulk was not smart enough, he felt useless, helpless. Pepper rocked him, whispering. "Don't fight so hard. It will pass. It comes and then it goes. It will go soon, Tony. I've got you. Squeeze my hand if you want to."

The Extremis burned itself out like a fading sunset after a few more minutes, and he finally relaxed, was limp and sweating profusely. Bruce relaxed visibly but was also shaken, calling to JARVIS to tell Rhodes it was safe to come back in. Tony was definitely exhibiting signs of intolerance to Extremis and he was in the most dangerous phase, phase two. But according to their calculations, he had to be in phase three to receive the drug they hoped would cure it, and even then they could not be 100% sure of its effectiveness.

James Rhodes came back in and after checking on Pepper and Tony, paced in frustration, trying to be the calm and reasonable one but wanting to rant and rave. He wanted to punch something, or shoot something, and maybe for good measure kill someone but they baddies were already dead. It wasn't just Tony, it wasn't just Pepper, it wasn't just Happy. It was stupid, but he missed the bots. He worried that with all the suits destroyed, they could face a thread without a way to handle it. His own armor was badly damaged by Killian and yeah, it was the least of their worries but it also bothered him to feel so helpless.

Then Tony hadn't even wanted coffee when he'd brought it earlier. It was seriously wrong. Rhodey would have sworn that Tony would use his dying breath to cool his coffee, would be drinking it as his last act. He hadn't truly worried about his friend until that moment when, pale and listless, Tony had barely opened his eyes and muttered incoherently, pushing the cup away. He'd shot Bruce a look expressing his anxiety, demanding an explanation but Bruce could only shake his head.

They both could only wait. Bruce estimated less than 24 hours left of phase two, maybe less.

Bruce had explained while Tony slept restlessly, Pepper curled beside him, feverish and still. Phase one prepared the subjects for exposure to the drug, by training the body to be in peak physical performance as much as possible. Extremis destroyed damaged tissue, so those like Killian or amputees suffered terribly at the initial exposure, but they had the most to gain. Small doses of Extremis were given to test for tolerance; phase one doses could kill without the dramatic explosions but for those who could tolerate it, it could give a boost to health and stamina, as well as a shortened recovery from injury and illness. 

In phase two, those that survived phase one were given a higher dose of the serum, pumping the subjects with even more of Extremis, causing pain as it flooded the body, saturating it on a cellular level. Until the Extremis was accepted or rejected, the subject became delirious, suffered from high fevers, wildly erratic vital signs, and pain. It lasted a few days, sometimes longer sometimes shorter, but the first 36 hours were the worst. Several people died of the stress and trauma, some exploded in spectacular fashion, some were killed by the serum itself acting like a poison instead of a panacea.

Others survived phase two only to die in the final phase. Phase three was when the pain ended and the body could truly test its limits with strength and healing. Pepper's strength and recovery from what should have been life-ending injuries put her firmly in phase three, but there was no guarantee of safety. Those in phase three relied on Extremis to survive and also experienced terrible withdrawals if they didn't take enough or take it regularly. There seemed to be some kind of tolerance built up, and subjects needed more and more to feel satisfied. It increased their strength and healing as well, but it came with its own drawbacks. None of the subjects had survived six months-- it was difficult to "regulate" as Maya had termed it, and the constant demand eventually ended in death by disintegration.

Killian was the only one who had achieved phase four, though Saven and Ellen Brandt had been nearly there. Able to cope with the higher and higher doses, they got more and more adept at regulating their strength and the heat. It turned Killian into a living thermoconductive weapon, nearly impossible to kill. Luckily, he was not quite a match for Pepper and the Iron Man missile normally meant for destroying tanks and bunkers.

When Rhodey knocked over one of the glass beakers and broke it and then a few minutes later tripped over a chord, unplugging the computer Bruce was using, Bruce took off his glasses and pinched the bridge of his nose. "Listen. You've been fretting about Happy, why don't you take a few minutes and go visit him. Get an update, huh? Some good news might really help them." He nodded at the couple, who were still for once, snatching a moment of sleep before it would inevitably be interrupted by nightmares or pain or fever. "There's nothing for you to do here, I promise. It will be much safer for all of us. Just for a while."

Rhodey saw right through his ploy to get rid of him, but he also saw the wisdom in it. He hadn't been resting too well himself and all he was doing was adding to the stress and anxiety. He went over to Tony, taking his best friend by the shoulder. "I'll be right back, Tones," he said and Tony stirred, opening his eyes.

"You leaving already?"

"Just to check on Hogan for a few minutes. Listen, do whatever Bruce tells you to do, or I'll kick your ass when I get back."

"You couldn't," Tony scoffed, weakly pushing his hand away. 

"Then I'll make Pepper."

"You wouldn't!"

"Don't test me, boy." Rhodey won a hard-earned smirk and squeezed his shoulder before he left. 

Pepper had woken up and was sitting on the bed. She pulled Tony's head onto her lap and stroked his hair until he fell back to sleep. She couldn't help but think of everything they'd been through in the past weeks.

...

It goes like this:

Killian overpowers her easily. Phil Coulson, before he died, had shown her a few self-defense moves but she was absolutely without a doubt completely defenseless against him. It amused him, actually, he thought it was funny, which humiliated and enraged her. Maya protested when he was egging her on, but she was more in a hurry than anything. Pepper had told Maya that Tony wasn't dead. She'd betrayed Tony to her, and to Killian. She couldn't warn Tony, she was going to be used against him, used as a weapon to hurt him, and she was unable to stop it or mitigate it in any way. She'd spent a good chunk of her life trying to help and protect Tony, who helped and protected everyone but himself, and she'd delivered herself to his enemies by trusting the wrong person. 

_He won't help you,_ she told them matter-of-factly. _He won't._

Maya injected Pepper herself. "Think of all the lives we'll save," she said, not looking Pepper in the eye. "Cure cancer. End physical disabilities. This is for a greater good, Pepper. It will benefit you, too, it will keep you from any illness or injury."

"If you don't blow up," Killian added maliciously, a cheerful, charming smile on his face. Maya gave him a dirty look, but Pepper had no response, as the pain of the injection overwhelmed her. It felt like her arm was being electrocuted and set on fire. Then it spread through her entire body. She longed to collapse, but she was restrained, upright, against a metal gurney. "I know that hurts," Killian continued unconcerned. " But for some reason, you're at slightly better odds upright. And you'll burn sheets, so sorry! No bed for you. Pretty soon you won't care anyway."

"Shut up, Killian!" Maya snapped as Pepper cried silently in pain. "You're not helping."

He'd shrugged. "I'm not trying to help. Getting Tony Stark to help was your idea. Mine is to make him suffer."

"Just knock it off!" Maya returned angrily. "Pepper didn't have anything to do with your little grudge against Tony."

"Well, technically, she rejected me too. For this being too 'weaponizable.' She's no innocent." Maya declined to answer him and he pleasantly hummed to himself as he typed up some information in the computer, monitoring Pepper's vital signs so he'd have time to leave the room if she ended up exploding. 

"It will help a lot of people. Maybe kids. It will help veterans who've served our country. The most vulnerable people, we can help them," she said insistently to Pepper. At least, Pepper was there while she was speaking, but she did not seem to be paying any kind of attention. Maya was more talking to herself, perhaps, trying to convince herself that the ends would justify the means.

Pepper drifted through the burning pain helplessly. After the first few hours, it didn't hurt as bad, at least not all the time. If she was very careful not to move at all, there were times when it only hurt a little bit. Any contact at all against her skin set off a cascade of burning pain and she begged them to take the restraints off, and her clothes hurt like her skin had been rubbed off, causing constant pain with every slight movement until Maya relented and took her shirt off for her, to Killian's amusement and leering. Pepper was beyond caring but Maya made him leave, and guarded the woman herself so the thugs Killian hired wouldn't be there staring at the vulnerable redhead.

"Tony," she murmured, delirious with pain. The last time she'd seen him they'd been arguing. They'd argued, they'd fought about leaving. She was right about that; she was usually right when she argued with Tony. They should have left but he thought they were safe. There were so many safeguards. The suits alone should have been a deterrent, but not with the suddenness of the attack, the sheer, overwhelming strength of it. They were arguing, and the... the rabbit.

The giant rabbit figured prominently in the delirious hallucinations that came and went over the next several hours. Her legs were so tired from standing. She slumped against her restraints, drifting off at times, exhausted from the constant fear and pain. She was afraid of the rabbit, it was big, it was on fire, but Tony had given it to her, she was angry but she knew he was trying his best, in a way. It exemplified him-- maximum effort in the completely wrong way; all she wanted was his happiness, his safety, and he'd told his address to a terrorist, thrown a gauntlet to challenge him. She hated him for making her afraid, hated the rabbit, but loved him so desperately that it all just made her sick. 

"Tony, make it stop," she'd begged after a while. Time had slid away; she had no idea if hours or days had passed. She was alone. Was she? She couldn't remember. There were people outside the room, she thought, but she'd thought somehow Tony was there. He wasn't there. He was far away, he was in Tennessee. He didn't know she was here, but they would tell him soon enough, soon enough.

Time drifted again and she heard the door open. "Maya?" Pepper called shakily.

"Oh, Maya. Maya, Maya. Is that who you were hoping for Pepper darling? Hoping you could manipulate her into switching sides and helping you and Tony?" Pepper shuddered as Killian walked in, as always seemingly carefree and completely indifferent to her suffering. He came up to her, close, way too close, almost touching. She could feel the heat from their bodies intermingling and bile rose in her throat. He laughed, interpreting her look. "Sorry Pepper. As much as I'd like to see you squirm, there's not enough time for that. And I'm not exactly interested in Tony Stark's sloppy seconds. Now. Maybe if the Extremis doesn't kill you? If I kill your boyfriend, maybe then. You'll be perfect." He put his face next to hers, again, almost touching. She wouldn't meet his eyes but she knew he was smirking, laughing at her fear. He laughed and walked back, collecting some equipment.

"Maya is dead, Pepper," he said over his shoulder. "Unfortunately you were right in your instincts that she would betray me. She tried so hard to get me to let Tony go. Oh, didn't I tell you? He's tied up, helpless as a kitten in a plastic sack. And he'll help me stabilize Extremis or watch you die... it actually doesn't matter to me that much, either way, can I be honest with you a moment? It is sometimes inconvenient when the soldiers explode unexpectedly, but we've developed a system for dealing with it that has its own benefits. We'll see," he concluded cheerfully. Pepper bit the inside of her cheek so hard it bled, hot and sharp. If Killian really had Tony, they were both in terrible, terrible danger. Rhodey was not in the country, Happy was in the hospital, and though the Avengers knew Tony was missing, none of them knew the dire situation they were in. And since Coulson died, no one in SHIELD ever seemed concerned with them anymore. She had never felt more helpless and alone.

"All right, Princess! Time to go! Are you excited to see your boyfriend? I'm sure he'll be so happy to see you! Now. I'm going to untie you. But don't get any ideas about running or escaping. You'll end up like poor Maya, believe me. And honestly, Pepper, Tony's only of any use to me if I can use you to manipulate him, so if you escape not only will you explode but I won't have any reason to keep him alive either," he sighed regretfully, still laughing at her. He was sure to brush his hands against her as he released her restraints and she remembered when he first came to her office, showing her the universe and his brain and how remarkable it all seemed, how full of potential. He'd seemed off to her even then, but she would never have suspected he was so darkly, blackly evil. 

Her legs collapsed from under her after so long being forced to stand in the same position. Killian gripped her arm tightly to keep her from falling and gave her a minute to get her legs under her. She could feel the burning strength in him, and felt an answering strength stir under her own skin. She wasn't in as much pain anymore; she'd heard Maya talking with the others and knew that that meant she was out of phase 2. Could it be that she was strong now? Could she possibly fight Killian and get away? Despite what he said, she knew she would try to escape if the chance presented itself.

Killian seemed to read her mind and laughed. "Oh Pepper. You're so delightful, you know that? I love a challenge. When I finally break your spirit, it's going to mean so much more. But I will kill you if you try anything."

Things had not gone according to Killian's plan. They weren't on the Norco very long before he was angry, shouting out orders to his soldiers. He'd put her in handcuffs in a chair, but he wouldn't leave her unsupervised now; she supposed that Tony had escaped, had outsmarted Killian though he always seemed to be one step ahead. She gathered that the President was also being used as a hostage or a sacrifice, she only heard bits and pieces. Her heart took strength from the idea that Tony was nearby, was trying to find her.

Things went to hell pretty quickly after that. A suit of armor that she'd never seen before came crashing in, zeroing in on Killian. Two other suits joined in the battle as soldiers and Killian fought back, destroying the room they were in. Pepper tore off the handcuffs and tried to escape but Killian grabbed her, stronger than she ever imagined, and as they fought the room completely collapsed, destroying the suits and the soldiers, burying Killian beneath her and trapping her under twisted metal.

She'd been frightened for a moment that one of the armors had contained Tony, but to her relief, it was only the armors, no Tony. JARVIS had acknowledged her with a "Ms. Potts," as he fought and she knew Tony would know where she was, he would be coming for her.

She was trapped under the weight of twisted metal; it should have killed her, or at least injured her. But though she felt as trapped and helpless as an insect on a pin, she was not hurt. She could sense Killian below her, stirring underneath the metal; the crushing weight had not killed him but like her, he was trapped beneath its weight. 

Then Tony had come, trying to locate her in the wreckage, the first time she'd seen him since the Mandarin blew up the mansion, and her heart broke into a million pieces to see his anxious, bloody and bruised face. "Tony," she breathed, and he tried to lift the metal.

"Put it down! Put it back, put it back," she begged, breathless. It was the only thing keeping Killian from attacking them. Tony didn't question her but reached for her. "See what happens when you hang out with my ex-girlfriends?" He said sarcastically as he stretched toward her. She loved him.

"You're such a jerk," she said, her voice breaking against the words.

"Yep. We'll talk about it over dinner. Come on." Her fingers touched those of the armor; she thought it would be cold metal but with all fires and Extremis heat, it was as warm as skin. "A little more baby," he coaxed her. 

Killian had managed to melt his way through the metal that trapped him, and his molten hand crashed through the floor between them and ripped at the arc reactor. Killian didn't have the time or the strength to completely rip out the arc reactor, but it damaged the suit and Pepper could see as Tony fell that it would be useless for combat now.

"Don't get up." Killian said politely as Tony struggled with the dead weight of the suit. He straddled Tony's body, looking interestedly in Tony's anxious face, his hand glowing orange with Extremis heat. He pressed his finger against the suit over Tony's heart. Pepper could hear his gasp of pain as the suit began to heat, burning his skin. "Are you feeling... stuck?" Killian said with a condescending pout. "Like a little turtle cooking in his little turtle suit?" The thing was. Pepper could see that he was helpless. The suit was malfunctioning and Killian was hundreds of times stronger anyway, the two armors that attacked him had not harmed him in the least, only managing to trap him but not injure him. 

"Oh Tony," Pepper said, crying. After everything, after Afghanistan and palladium poisoning, after the Battle of New York, after the mansion's destruction and escaping captivity, he was helpless and Killian was going to kill him right in front of her. 

Her sorrow and Tony's fear made Killian laugh, exultant. It was everything he wanted. "She's watching," he said maliciously. "I think you should close your eyes." Admit defeat. "Close your eyes. Close them. You don't want to see this." The heat and pain reached a breaking point. Tony thanked whatever gods that were watching that he was in the armor with a blade and sliced off Killian's arm. The man screamed in pain and immediately fell back.

"Yeah. You take a minute," Tony advised with a murmur. Unfortunately, the arm was molten hot; it burned through the floor already weakened from Killian clawing his way out and Pepper and tons of metal all fell through. 

Pain ratcheted through her body as she landed half on, half off the edge of a piece of machinery. It started moving, activated somehow, moving her away from Killian but away from Tony too and she just had to tell him--

She was high in the air now. She could hear the sounds of a fierce and deadly battle going on, but it seemed far away. Her body felt far away, foreign to her, separate. She felt the cool wind, now, out of the heat of battle, cooling the sweat on her scalp. She wasn't cold. She was afraid but it felt far away as well. "Tony," she murmured. He would be nearby. She was going to fall soon, she was slipping. She was holding on but just barely. She couldn't pull herself up, there was no leverage, no way to get momentum. She would fall soon.

She saw him below her, no armor, naked to any attack, vulnerable to any enemy, but he only had eyes for her. "Pep, I got you. Relax, I got you!" She could see the anxiety, the fear in his eyes, as he realized he hadn't truly lost everything yet but he was about to. She slipped and let out a scream of terror as she saw the fire burning brightly in the darkness beneath her. "Just look at me!" He demanded. "Honey, I can't reach any further and you can't stay there. All right? You gotta let go." Her grip was the only thing keeping her from falling, the only thing keeping her from Tony. "You've got to let go! I'll catch you I promise!" 

She let go.

In the same instant the machinery shifted, and their fingers just brushed as she fell, screaming, to the fires below.

The fall, the fall was over fast. It only took moments, she barely had time to register. Then, the impact. Then, the burning. 

Every bone in her body shattered like glass; she could feel each and every single one. She felt the trauma tear her skin, her muscles, her vessels, and blood exploded from their delicate restraints like a dropped water balloon. The fire burned her, bathed her, but now the pain of it was nothing. It soothed her. The heat was like an embrace and she felt the fire of Extremis throughout her body, but it was _healing_ her, making her stronger in the broken places. She lay in the fire without moving, feeling the pain and feeling the pain leave, her mind reeling. She was alive. She was alive. She was _strong._ She tried breathing. She tried moving. Everything felt new, different. She felt strong, but so afraid, so afraid. Everything was through the dimming haze, the burning. She'd seen Killian's eyes like that, when he burned, when he killed--

It seemed a long time later as she burned in the warmth of the fire, but she heard Tony. She heard Killian. She got up. She picked up a long length of a metal made of steel.

"It was always me, Tony. Right from the start. I am the Mandarin!" Killian stood over Tony, burning, murderous.

She remembered him touching her. She remembered him tormenting Tony, burning him. Killing Maya. With all her strength, she swung the steel around and up, catching him under the chin and knocking him flying back several yards. She saw Tony, but he barely seemed recognizable to her; he was injured, he was again without armor, he was on the ground holding his ankle. She stared at him, and he looked at her in shock.

"I got nothing."

She heard the rush of the repulsors on an Iron Man armor, heard Tony instructing JARVIS to disengage but JARVIS didn't recognize her, didn't hear Tony. A repulsor blast missed her face by inches then flew off to circle back for another shot and she looked at Tony furiously. "What? Oh, what? Are you mad at me?" She ran straight toward him, her body strong and lithe and _perfect_ as Killian had promised, in her perfect control as she used her momentum to launch herself using Tony's raised knee, punching through the armor as if it were butter, slamming it to the ground and looking to Tony. He looked at her, shaken, and now it was him that could barely recognize her. He didn't know her. 

She didn't know if she knew herself either.

She slid her hand in the gauntlet, punching Killian, who was still trying to heal from being hit and blown up. He was vulnerable, she could see his weakness. His foolishness, his utter stupidity. She felt her hatred burn off into an unquenchable rage, that he had dared to harm her, harm Tony, inject her body with Extremis against her will. Nearly killing Happy, killing innocent people. She kicked a missile that had come loose from an armor and fired, killing Kilian in a spectacular blast of heat. She watched him burn without pity.

"Honey?" She looked back, her eyes still seeing through a haze, through rage and vindictive pleasure at Killian's death. 

She saw Tony.

Soft, injured, without armor. Her Tony. The way she'd seen him right after Afghanistan, as if for the first time, and they'd come so close to losing each other so many times she didn't know if she could keep bearing it except when she saw him, saw his vulnerability, his gentleness, his anxiety, and the haze disappeared. 

"That was really violent," she said tremulously. She always hated that, the violence.

Tony shook his head, his heart on his sleeve, his pain and grief and relief on his face. He could never hide anything from her. "You just scared the devil out of me," he said softly. "I thought you were--" he cut off, unable to say the words.

"I was dead, why?" She said sarcastically. "Because I fell two hundred feet?" She swallowed, realizing she shouldn't have said it either. It filled her with fear again. She shouldn't have survived that. What would it mean? "Who's the hot mess now?" She asked him with an edge of bitterness and challenge.

"Still debatable." Typical. "Probably tippin' your way a little bit." She heard the softness, the gentleness creep in his words. "Why don't you dress like this at home? Sports bra, the whole deal." He tried to blow it off.

Pepper looked down at what she was wearing, only then noticing she was still wearing the Iron Man gauntlet. A little piece of Tony, really, his tech, something he made with his mind and heart and hands. Alone, she wouldn't have been able to stop Killian. With the gauntlet, he never stood a chance. "You know I think I understand why you don't want to give up the suits. What am I going to complain about now?"

If he had stopped when she asked, they'd both be dead right now, and probably the president.

"Well, it's me. You'll think of something." She heard his heartbreak in his voice, how much he meant it, how sad and anxious he was. He was still reeling from the loss of her, still traumatized. His heart could not catch up with his brain, it was still broken, still shattered. He'd lost her. For a few minutes, he'd lived in a world without Pepper Potts, and though she was returned to him, he wasn't sure if he could be the same, if he could recover. She saw his eyes, his desolation and grief, and automatically reached for him and he reached for her before she drew back.

"No, don't touch me!" She'd said. "I'll burn you!"

"You're not going to burn me." He wasn't sure but he didn't care if he was wrong, he needed to touch her, needed to reassure himself she was real. Luckily he was right. "Not hot."

"Am I going to be okay?" She asked, needing reassurance too.

"No." Her blue eyes pierced into his sad brown ones. "You're in a relationship with me, everything will never be okay." 

Her poor, broken Tony.

"But I can figure this out, yeah. I almost had this twenty years ago when I was drunk, I think I can get you better. That's what I do." He sounded surer, more himself. "I fix things."

But she wasn't buying it. He'd been breaking and breaking all this time since New York, and he wasn't fixing things. He was tinkering. He needed help and refused it get it, instead distracting himself by creating more and more armors. "And... all your distractions?" She asked skeptically.

"Uh, I'm going to shave them down a little bit." He kept his hand on her arm. "JARVIS?" He tapped his ear. "Hey."

"All finished up here, sir. Will there be anything else?" He hinted. Tony had created the Clean Slate Protocol after an armor had been inadvertently called in his sleep. It was the first time he'd realized his obsession could be dangerous, could have unforeseen consequences. He'd created the protocol but JARVIS was skeptical he would ever enact it. It would be tantamount to admitting he needed help. 

"You know what to do," Tony confirmed. 

"The Clean Plate Protocol, sir?" JARVIS asked incredulously. He was happy. He'd seen the dangerous turn creating armors had been. 

"Screw it, it's Christmas. Yeah. Yes."

Tony didn't watch as the armors exploded around them, he just held Pepper, the one true reality, his whole world, and the only thing that mattered. Still, he felt the blasts and destruction as a physical blow; he'd named and specialized each armor, given them personality and character. They were in no small way a part of himself, not  
like children but something, something close to it. 

He'd asked her, he'd asked her to let go. So now so was he.


End file.
